Jyn Waye’s hand-painted Air Force 1s belong in the MoMA

Jyn Waye knows a thing or two about turning nostalgia into art. The Oregon-based artist finds inspiration in hallowed works like Sailor Moon and Hayoi Miyazaki's beautiful opus Spirited Away, 90s video games like Sonic the Hedgehog, all while using a fucking cool canvas: a crisp pair of white Air Force 1s. I first saw Waye's work while deep in an Instagram k-hole and her gorgeous paintings of my favorite teenage cosmic superheroes Sailor Moon and Sailor Mars, pictured above, took my breath away and made me feel like I was in the iconic anime myself.

ADVERTISEMENT

Each Air Force 1 is painstakingly hand-painted — that's right, paint — and she's insanely talented at it. In an interview with V Files, Waye spoke about how the sneaker painting came about, and like all natural talents, she effortlessly fell into it.

"For as long as I can remember, I painted skateboard decks and guitars. It was just a matter of time before I started painting sneakers, but I didn’t get around to it until my friend got me an extra pair of Air Force 1s from the Nike employee store," she said. "They weren’t my size, so we figured I should paint them and maybe make some money off of them. I put them up on my Instagram and people started to bid for them – it was wild. I’ve been painting [Air Force 1s] ever since."

Scroll down to see some jaw-dropping sneaker art, but don't get too excited; as of now, Waye isn't taking any new commissions.